ACTIVE DID A mental head count as he rolled up to the Mercer home on Beach Street the next morning. Just Suka and the First Mate if the kids were at her parents’ place. Otherwise, Pudu and the three daughters he hadn’t yet met would also be climbing in or on. Six Mercers in all for the ride the airport.
But he could take only four in the cab with him—three in the back seat and one in front. That left the truck bed for the other two, who presumably would be Pudu and the First Mate.
Not legal, strictly speaking, but who was going to arrest him? He was the law south of the Brooks Range and north of the Yukon River, pretty much. Plus he would have the governor on board.
But, when the Mercers marched out with their duffle, the head count was only two.
“No kids?” Active asked the First Mate as they tossed bags into the bed. He was burly for an Inupiaq, probably from the white half of his genes. He had an agreeable face, lightly stubbled and a little weathered from his time on the trail. Ruggedly handsome, the celebrity magazines usually called him. Tundrabunny had even once offered to let the First Mate “ride my runners anytime.”
“Nope,” he said. “This way they’re not switching schools all the time. And they can be around their friends. That kinda stuff is really important to girls, I guess. Especially the friends. For Pudu, it’s huntin’, fishin’, and basketball. I had to fight Helen on it because she always wants them around her—especially Pudu—but I knew Juneau wouldn’t work for them.”
“But you yourself don’t mind it much?”
The First Mate shot a glance at the governor and grinned a little. “She’s got something I need. Even after all these years.”
Active let it pass. “So what do you do with yourself down there in Juneau?”
“Handle constituent calls for Helen if they’re from Natives, sometimes, but mostly I just wish we were up here. Not much country for an Eskimo with the big trees and all that rain. But I’m back and forth a lot, what with doing my two weeks on and two off at the mine. So I spend a few days here at either end of my shift. I can keep in touch with the kids and run the dogs some and do a little huntin’ and fishin’ myself.”
Active headed for the driver’s door, then noticed the governor still at the front passenger door. She frowned and shot him a glance from the corner of her eye. Once again, he had forgotten the chauffeur part of his bodyguard duties.
“Sorry, Suka,” he said as he assisted her into the cab. “Where are my manners?”
“You’ve probably been in Chukchi too long. Don’t forget, I have an opening in Anchorage.”
He said nothing, but went to his side of the truck and climbed in.
“Grace feeling better this morning?” the governor asked as he switched on the engine.
“I haven’t had a chance to talk to her. She was still in bed when I left.”
Mercer lifted her chin and touched the bandages on her neck. “I hope it wasn’t these.”
“I’m sure it wasn’t, Suka. Grace knows better than to believe gossip. Especially from the Internet.”
“I hope so. We’ll need to get Pudu at my folks’ place. I want to get some more video before I leave.”
He headed for the house and the morning sun hit the cab for the first time. It picked out a bruise over one of Mercer’s eyes, with maybe trace of dried blood on it.
Come to think of it, the First Mate had looked a little haggard as they hoisted in the bags. Maybe the Mercers had done some catching up? Maybe they liked it rough?
He checked himself and shook his head. Why did his thoughts always drift that way in Mercer’s presence?
But mention the injury or not? She was a woman, so she undoubtedly knew about it already. If not, if she’d dressed in a hurry or something, she’d show up for her flight with a bruise and a scab. People would notice and somebody would get a video then it would be all over the Internet, just like the scratches. What if the poster mentioned he was with her at the airport?
“Um, Suka?”
She turned his way. He touched the same spot over his own eye. “Do you—”
“Oh, crap, I forgot!” She twisted the rear view mirror around for a look, then got out her phone to use the selfie camera and fished in her purse for makeup and a tissue. “I am such a klutz! But you knew that, right?”
She talked as she dabbed the blood spot and worked with her makeup kit. “I was pulling bags out of the closet this morning while I was talking on this damn thing and one of them fell off the shelf and hit me right in the face which I hope will teach me I should never multitask but I doubt it!”
Faster than Active would have thought possible, the bruise vanished. She put away the phone and makeup. “Unlike the heroic scratches I got in Cowboy’s tent in the line of duty, this was just plain stupid. Which is why God made concealer, right?”
“Right,” he said, though he had never heard of concealer before.
Pudu came out when he pulled up in front of the grandparents’ house. Helen moved to the left rear seat as usual, and Pudu took right front to capture her in profile as she rolled through the streets of her home town.
Active saw the Mercers through security, returned Pudu to his grandparents, and was tempted to put in a couple of hours at the office to postpone the inevitable. Then he decided it was pointless.
Helen Mercer might be gone, but not so the problem of Grace Palmer. The same Grace Palmer who had refused to attend last night’s Isignaq 400 Musher’s Banquet with him, so furious over the scratches on the First Neck that he had elected to hole up at their new place for the night in hopes she’d cool off after sleeping on it. The question was, had she? She wasn’t answering the phone.
When he pulled the crew cab to a stop in front of her house, empty paint cans on the front steps were the only evidence of the whirlwind of renovation that had swept through in in the past few days. The conversion to the Chukchi Regional Women’s Shelter must be almost done.
Active let himself in and wrinkled his nose at the paint fumes.
“Grace?”
“Up here,” she shouted from the second floor.
“Be there in a sec. I’m going to open a window and air the place out a little.” The house was quieter than usual, he noticed. “Nita at school?”
“Yep. And eating at the cafeteria, not here—they’re having fish sticks and tater tots, her all-time favorite. We’ve got the place to ourselves today.”
Place to themselves? Why would she mention that, he wondered as he wrenched at the window over the kitchen sink. He was about to shout the question upstairs when he heard Grace’s footsteps coming down. She brushed past on her way to the refrigerator, leaving him lost in the scent of lavender. Then he noticed she was wearing one of his old Trooper uniform shirts, unbuttoned, and not much else. So that was what the Nita thing was all about. Maybe they would make it work this time? Daytime, nighttime, any time was fine with him. But how about Grace?
He moved to the refrigerator and had just laid hands on that wonderful swell of hips when the work phone in his pocket went off. He pulled it out to dismiss the call, then saw the number, rolled his eyes, and stepped back, a hand raised in supplication.
“Hello, Governor, I’m fine, thanks, everything OK? Oh, sorry. Of course, I remember, ah, Suka, is everything OK?”
Now Grace rolled her eyes. She bent over to retrieve a can of Diet Pepsi from the refrigerator and he realized that “not much else” didn’t quite capture her state of undress. Grace was wearing the old Trooper shirt and nothing else. He averted his eyes so as to be able track what the governor was saying.
“I’m sorry, what?…Actually, it was kind of an adventure…yes, you’re right, cell service would have been nice up there…what? Cell towers?…I’m sure it could be done, but the cost of those remote tow—run it through the public safety budget? So, yeah, there’ll be some administrative overhead, of course. What?… OK, a supplemental appropriation would be great…OK, sure, and thanks, uh, Suka.”
Grace eased up behind him and slipped her hands into his trouser pockets. He jumped.
“Uh, listen, Suka.” His throat tightened and it was hard to get words out. “Can I call you back? Dispatch is calling. Apparently something has come up…yes, thanks again, all right, sure, call me when you land in Juneau.”
“So it’s ‘Suka’ now?” Grace was in front of him, an eyebrow cocked. The work shirt had swung open, but not far enough, not yet.
Active grinned. “Her choice, not mine. And she wants to put cell towers along the Isignaq.”
“Seriously.”
He nodded. “No doubt so she can tweet live and direct from the wilderness the next time her plane goes down. I’m sure the cost of remote towers will be astronomical, but she’s gonna say it’s a public safety issue and run it through my budget, so all’s well. She even suggested we bump up our cut for administrative overhead by a couple points and put the gravy into the village crisis centers. All good, right?”
“Very good.” She didn’t sound sincere.
“She’s a woman of boundless energy,” he said in a cautious tone. “Like a bouncing football, sometimes.”
“Sounds like a case of pibloktoq to me.”
He frowned. “Pibloktoq, that’s, ah…what is that?”
“Arctic hysteria.” The quicksilver eyes sparkled, then paused in concentration. “Let’s see, I believe the exact wording is, a dissociative episode characterized by extreme excitement of up to thirty minutes, followed by convulsive seizures and coma lasting up to half a day.”
He grinned, not surprised something so obscure should have stuck to that brain of hers. “Frenzy, convulsions, and half-day comas? This would be observed primarily in the female of the species, I’m guessing?”
She grinned back. “Exactly. Especially gorgeous female governors who fly around the Arctic wilderness with hunky young cops.”
“This particular governor has a hunky young husband who races sled dogs and is very large and fit. So I doubt she’d be interested. And you know I wouldn’t, long as she doesn’t mess with my budget.”
“The hell I do.” The quicksilver in her eyes was gone, replaced by fire.
What switch had he flipped, and how?
“You spend the night in a tent with her, guarding that so-called body of hers, she comes out with scratches on her neck, and Tundrabunny is all over the Internet about how you—what was it she said?—canoodled with America’s most gorgeous governor in a tent actually called the Arctic Oven.”
“What was I supposed to do? She scratched herself and she made Pudu tape it and put it on YouTube and now—”
“And now I walk down here all tarted up like this and the next thing I know you’re on the phone with her and it’s ‘Suka’ this and ‘Suka’ that? What is she, in your contacts now?”
“She is the gov—”
“Yes, she is, and it seems like she’s got you on a mighty short leash.”
“She controls over half my budget, not to mention the appropriation for your crisis shelters. What am I supp—”
“Maybe that’s what you like, huh? The woman on top? Handcuffs and a blindfold?”
“What’s gotten into you? You’re not—” He leaned over to check her breath. She pushed him back so hard he stumbled against the sink.
“No, I’m not drinking. I just can’t give you what you need, so you’re out collecting it from our hot little governor with benefits. I hear there’s nothing she likes better than serving her male constituents!”
“You know I’m not like that.”
“You’re a normal man with normal appetites. Of course you’re tired of hand jobs.” He winced at the desperation in her voice. “Let’s get this over with.”
She pulled open the shirt and pushed out her breasts and they were too much for him. He brushed the nipples with his palms, felt them swell, then pulled her to him and crushed his lips against hers. She reached up and sank her nails into his scalp. He groaned and slid his tongue into her warm, wet mouth. She responded for a second and the word “Finally!” came into his head and he boosted her onto the counter and fumbled with his belt buckle. Then it was over. She went rigid in his arms. He let her go and eased back a little.
“Just do it. I have to get past this.”
“I can’t, not like this. It’s not in me.”
“Just take me! Get me drunk. Something, anything. Help me undo what Jason did. Pretend I’m her if you have to.”
Pretend she was Helen Mercer? My God, was it possible she could read his mind?
He shook off the picture of Mercer in the Trooper shirt and pulled Grace in and wrapped her in a bear hug. “Stop that.” He softened his voice. “Stop it now.”
Somehow, that un-flipped the switch. She relaxed like a swaddled infant.
“Sorry, baby,” she sobbed into his neck. “I’m scared I’m never going to get there. It’s like I’m out on an ice floe and I can see the shore but I just can’t make the jump to normal. Go. Find someone else. A man can’t live without sex.”
“Come on, let’s talk. Please?”
“No!” Her tone softened. “No.”
She kissed him long and deep. “At least sit back and relax and let these hands work their magic.” She give him an exploratory grope. “See? Little Nathan’s interested.”
She led him into the living room, pushed him into an armchair, knelt between his knees and opened his fly.
His phone marimbaed again. Her look dared him to answer it. His eyes dropped to the screen.
“Yes, it’s Chief Active. Sorry, Governor, I’m still tied up. All right, Suka. But, I have to go. OK, sure, I’ll call when your plane lands in Anchorage, I promise.” He ended the call while she was still talking.
Grace was already on the stairs. She stalked into her father’s bedroom and slammed the door.
His phone marimbaed again. Did he dare let Mercer go to voicemail after hanging up on her? But it wasn’t “Governor” he saw when he checked the caller ID. It was the dispatch line at public safety. What now?
“Chief Active,” he said.
He listened as the dispatcher reported a drunk passed out on the Isignaq trail a half mile east of the airport. “Why didn’t the guy bring the drunk in himself?”
“That’s not in my notes,” said the dispatcher, a man named Winkler whom Active had inherited with the new job. “Mr. Sundown’s pretty deaf, so it was kind of hard to ask him any questions, Chief.”
Asking questions in English of an older Inupiaq with hearing damaged by snowgos, outboards, rifles, and shotguns wasn’t so difficult when you got used to it. You just had to speak loud and clear, then wait out the long pauses that were part of any conversation with an elder. That was how old Inupiat talked. But Winkler was white and pretty new to Chukchi, like everybody on the force except himself and Alan Long. Winkler didn’t speak Bush yet.
“OK,” Active said. “Find Alan Long and send him out to retrieve the guy. Tell him to take his EMT kit, a sled, some sleeping bags—the usual, all right? The guy’s probably hypothermic.”
“Got it, Chief.”
Winkler rang off while Active pondered the oddness of being called ‘Chief.’ Should he ask his people to call him something else? If so, what?
Then reality kicked back in and he headed upstairs for the apology. Maybe Grace would be charmed by the drunk passed out on the tundra. It was pure Chukchi. At least she’d know it wasn’t another call from Helen Mercer.